Regular readers will know that I’m on something of a mission: for the past 20 years, I’ve been beavering away trying to make my garden as wildlife-friendly as possible, and sharing my experiences in regular blogs and articles and books.
I believe that gardeners can have an amazing impact for wildlife, and by getting your hands dirty you also better understand the natural world and the threats it faces in the wider landscape. It tunes you in to nature.
However, every now and then I like to take a step back and ask myself an important question: are the thing I am doing in my garden truly bearing fruit? Honestly, objectively, am I saving nature?
So here are the headlines, warts and all. To start, here is a quick resume of what I’ve done in my current garden, which I’ve had since December 2014.
So far, I have:
Gosh, put like that, it doesn’t sound very much, and in fact the removal of so many trees to start with, while wholly necessary, actually removed a lot of cover from the garden (the winter roosting Wood Pigeons were probably not too pleased!).
But, being more kindly to myself, I can think with pride of the effort to hand-dig the pond, which is 15 metres (50 foot) long.
And I’ve increased the plant diversity in the garden from just over 200 species to just under 500, and all of them chosen because of their wildlife value.
The proof of the pudding, however, is how nature has responded. Well, I’ve been recording several of the groups of wildlife that visit my garden each week so that I am better able to answer that question. I can’t tell you if my woodlouse population is booming (they seem to be very happy, but I haven’t been counting them), but I can tell you chapter and verse on my bats, butterflies, dragonflies, reptiles, grasshoppers, stag beetles and birds.
For example:
So has anything gone down? Well, yes, the Frog population seems to be struggling. It could be the boom in Smooth Newts; it could be the Grass Snakes. Also, the loss of the leylandii means that Goldcrests and Coal Tits now visit a little less frequently. And I still have no Starlings.
There’s lots more still for me to do: the area of meadow will eventually be four times the size, I’m going to put in another pond, my Bee Borders are yet to mature, and I want to make a Bat Cave (I’m not sure how, but it’s there on the wish list). These first four years have largely been about getting the layout in place, the heavy-lifting; from next year, the focus will shift to plants and growing lots of flowers from seed, and I’m predicting a big growth in my butterfly population
So, that’s me, but what about you? What successes – and challenges – have you had in your garden or local greenspace? We’d love you to respond to this blog and tell us your story. And don’t worry if you don’t have a big garden; little achievements in small gardens all add up across the country (in fact, I always say that each triumph in a small garden is all the sweeter!).
If you want to drop by my RSPB wildlife gardening blog, it is updated every Friday, and I'd love to see you there - www.rspb.org.uk/community/blogs/hfw
Hello. We are lucky in having a 6 acre plot we leave about a third to grow wild we have 2 bird feed stations and we have so many birds of all types and get through a kilo of bird food a day. Seed meal wirms and fat balls plus left over fruit. We have Deer Badgers snakes hedge hogs etc. We get swallows every summer as well as cuckos . Saw our 1st turtle dove last week. It is so beautiful in the evenings to sit out and listen to all the birds singing. Have put up swift box and house martin nests but there not being used yet . Next job is owl box. We have 2 buzzards at present but they tend to go at end of summer
thanks, Koa. As you no doubt know, Turtle Doves are our most threatened bird in the UK, and with 6 acres you can really make a difference for a bird like that - they love dense scrub to nest in and lots of seed to feed on
Hello. A third of our garden is completly wild with lots of dense growth. The 2 horse paddocks are cut but the outsides you can hardly walk through. This year a third paddock is going to be (hopefully) planted with wild flowers .we dont use any weed killer or fertiliser but we harrow and most years we have good grass all year round. At moment have 2 collard doves and finches and house sparrows feeding oh and a robin and some thrushes. Although in summer the thrushes are fewer than in winter when we get near 50- 100 feeding on some days. They all pay us back with thier presence. Want to find out if when we go if RSPB would be interested in taking over part of land for nature sanctury?